SlySoft, a developer of software designed to bypass DRM (Digital Rights Management) on many media formats have announced that they have broken BD+ encryption.

BD+ is a component of the Blu-ray Disc Digital Rights Management system that was introduced back in June 2007 to offer extra protection against piracy.

BD+ also played its part in helping Blu-Ray as a format help win the war with HD-DVD as several studios stated that the BD+ anti-copying system was one of the factors behind them backing Blu-ray Disc over HD DVD.

SlySoft said:

Film studios that have switched to Blu-ray may have crowed a little too early because the much-praised BD+ copy protection is an adabsurdum affair now, too.

Richard Doherty of the Envisioneering Group will have to revise his statement from July, 2007 regarding BD+: "BD+, unlike AACS whichsuffered a partial hack last year, won't likely be breached for 10 years". It is worth mentioning that since he made that statement onlyeight months have gone by.

Peer van Heuen, head of High-Definition technologies at SlySoft adds:

"Admittedly, we are not really so fast with this because actually we had intended to publish this release already in December as promised.However, it was decided for strategic reasons to wait a bit for the outcome of the "format war" between HD DVD and Blu-ray. On top ofthat, we first wanted to see our assumptions confirmed regarding the BD+ Virtual Machine. We are rather proud to have brought back to earth the highly-praised and previously "unbreakable" BD+. However, we must also admit that the Blu-ray titles released up to now have not fully exploited the possibilities of BD+. Future releases will undoubtedly have a modified and more polished BD+ protection, but we are well prepared for this and await the coming developments rather relaxed". Van Heuen adds jokingly: "The worst-case scenario then is our boss locks us up with only bread and water in the company dungeon for three months until we are successful again".

So it turns out Blu-Ray isn't as impregnable as first thought. Surely with any new format it's only a matter of time before someone somewhere manages to crack it?